I catch a bus and a train to work every morning. In doing so I see several hundred other people doing the same thing. How many of them make eye contact? Very few. How many of them smile? Very few. How many of them actually speak to me? None.
One of the problems we have in our cities is loneliness. Our cities have lost any real sense of close community. I think it’s fair to say that most of the folk I see are focused on their morning’s purpose. Getting to work. I think that's true, but what else are they focused on?
I decided the other morning to see how many people I could meaningfully engage in my morning commute. I made eye contact with three people. Three. I smiled at every single one of them. One of them returned my friendliness. And another spoke to me, but only because he was trapped in the same elevator! I am sure at the end of our one floor journey he had come to appreciate that contact, that kindness that I wanted to share. That encouragement: “Have a great day.” I think his parting smile told me what I needed to know.
But in all those hundreds of people I was able to engage only three. The rest of them were locked in their shells. I discovered there is such a thing as a “negative politeness culture.” This says that you shouldn’t impinge on another’s personal space without just cause, otherwise you will be considered rude. Since when is “Hey, how are you?” considered rude?
What did I miss?
We live in a very sad world if my encouraging someone into their day is now considered rude. Part of the loneliness mentioned above is that total lack of engagement. When I first moved to Brisbane, I knew no one, did not know where to go to meet people. I had work and a couple of friends whom I relied on for social interaction. Of course this changed in time. But I remember that one of the things I did not do was seek out a community to which I could belong.
Even to this day I couldn’t answer that question of why not?
Would it have been easier had I stepped out of my front door and say gone to join the local Lions Club, or sporting club, or even found a church? But I was involved with work and my own space, and I am confident to suggest that a lot of other people who are living isolated lives in big cities are very much the same.
They come home from work, close their doors, and that’s it. They do not in any way invite interaction.
How do work out this burden of isolation? What answer can we give?
A simple solution to a complex problem. “Come to me…”
That calming voice full of promise and love. “Come to me all who labour and are heavy laden …”
Those who work and are weighed down with their own troubles, their own self-doubts and misgivings, their lack of self-esteem, their anxieties, their worries. “Come to me…” this voice says.
Jesus offers us freedom from the complexity that we live in. “Take my yoke upon you….” But what is His yoke? There is no toil to a task other than loving Him, knowing Him, being obedient to Him.
Each yoke was made to fit each ox, individually, so that the ox would not chaff under the burden of it. Yet He is there helping us carry the weight! If we take on any other yoke we will cripple ourselves carrying it. If we carry the sum total of all our burdens where are we?
“…learn from me …” No one else has the answers. No one else can offer solace or truth. Note here the root of the word for learn, Greek manthano, from math, to learn, to be educated. It is the same root word from which we get mathetes, disciples. To be with Him to learn His truth, we become His disciples.
For He is gentle and humble in heart, and those who seek him earnestly, those who are prepared to give up the old way of doing things and take on His way of doing things will find the rest they crave, rest from all those burdens that have shoehorned them into a place of isolation and loneliness.
What Jesus is offering here is Salvation. Step away from all that the world offers, step into the Kingdom and the embrace of Christ who loves us. What He is offering us is His great Mercy, His Grace. We cannot achieve salvation on our own. We cannot achieve everlasting life through our own works.
Nor can we change the world that is around us. But we can open ourselves to Christ so that His Peace and His Love become ours, His yoke on our shoulders is light and resplendent with promise.
If we take on His yoke, we will have rest.
Amen.